Posse Career Advice?
Aurele
time. The Posse are some really smart and well-connected tech guys and
I'd like to hear their career advice? Or maybe the posse could
interview some execs who have industry-wide perspective to give good
advice on directions to head in.
What are some good fields to be working in or be switching to? What
are some good markets to look at? What are some useful skills to have?
I've been a programmer for 13 years, I have a wide range of tech
skills, I have a reputation for writing the best code and meeting
deadlines. Now, I'm paid much more than I'm used to, I'm very happy
with my salary and working conditions, but honestly, I don't like the
work: I do almost entirely maintenance on apps other people wrote, I
have very minimal input into anything, the work I do is necessary, but
it's very boring stuff that no one cares about. My manager is
extremely nice as a person and regarding HR issues (way nicer than
managers I've had in the past), but he's not willing to listen to my
concerns. His attitude is that I'm paid very highly and treated well,
so I need to do exactly what they want whether I like it or not. That
attitude is completely fair. They should get what they pay for and I'm
grateful to have a decent job, but ultimately, I need to develop a
better career plan for the future.
I'm taking night-classes (currently science/engineering). Business
classes are probably a smarter move, so I will probably move more in
that direction in the near future.
I'm not opposed to software work, but I don't see a lot of the types
of jobs that I really want: where I get to work on something
interesting, I get some degree of autonomy, there is basic job
stability, and the money is decent.
What are some good careers to go into? What kind of classes should I
take at night? What skills should I try to learn in my free time?
Daniel Yokomizo
I've been hearing that this "Ruby on Rails" thing is going to kill Java ;)
Now seriously, if you want more exciting work you can always
join/found a startup. Just save a big lump of cash (call it exit plan
A ;), start some idea on the nights/weekends (be careful with no
compete clauses, copyright issues, etc. WRT your current employer) and
see if you can build something exciting and interesting. If you have
the opportunity (and a big safe exit plan A) join a startup, it's a
lot of work but very interesting.
On career advancement it's pretty tough to go through paths other than
management, but you can try to learn lots of stuff on a different area
(e.g. law, ecology, marketing) and try to get a better programming job
that explores these strengths: for example if you get a masters on
financial markets you can try your luck with programming for Wall
Street.
If you like programming but just don't love the stuff you do at your
work I would suggest to improve your programming knowledge (learning a
couple of really different programming languages is always a good
thing) and go the startup/independent consultant road (that's what I
did).
If you're thinking about a career change, the best thing to do would
find something you already now a bit and like and try to pursue this
road. Some people get good advice from professional career counselors,
I'm not into this but you may find it to be helpful. A good technique
to find new interests is just buy a bunch of (great) books on
different subjects and read them all. Go buy a second book about the
ones you find really interesting, later after you trim down your
options, start following blogs, podcasts, etc. about these subjects.
You'll learn some great stuff and hopefully discover something that
interests you
Best regards,
Daniel Yokomizo
Ricardo
Perhaps you don't need to change careers, just your company or your
environment. If you think that you are getting stuck working on code
maintenance rather than new development, talk to your manager or look
around at other companies. If you still like writing software, take
classes on software design and architecture. You can also look into
working on some open source projects in order to find where your
interests lie. With a tight job market, employers are less likely to
hire people with no experience and are more likely to hire mid-level
developers that they do not need to completely train.
-R
Vince O'Sullivan
> What are some good careers to go into?
is that it's not what you want to do. For most people though, a
career is something that they have to do to finance the stuff that
they want to do.
> What kind of classes should I take at night?
taking science/engineering classes suggests to me that you don't want
to management. Also, the fact that you're posting on a computing
forum suggests you want to do software development. If that's the
case then why look at management courses. Do you really want to
manage people for a career?
> What skills should I try to learn in my free time?
dating? It's not all about work.
To be honest; Given that you haven't really said what you want to do,
it's more or less impossible to give advice on how to do it. On the
other hand, I would suggest booking a session with a professional
career advisor. Just sitting with someone who knows the issues and
can talk them through with you can be very enlightening.
Aurele
Mostly that's all great standard advice. Although, I disagree with two
points:
Save tons of money to self-fund dream job: This sounds great, but
empirically, this plan almost never pans out. Of course, saving money
is very important, but grand plans to save a small fortune so you can
launch your dream venture or be independently wealthy are somewhat
unrealistic.
"a career is something that they have to do to finance the stuff that
they want to do."
lots of people really do enjoy or at least engaged by their careers.
I'd still like to hear more about the different career paths available
in industry. Which are the realistic opportunities for talented but
over-30 programmers? Science? Biotech? Aside from standard manager
roles, what types of business positions are available? What do
economics and math grads do in the industry (not the professions or
academia) outside of regular programming roles?
Thanks again everyone! I feel way better about my lot in life :)
Alexey Zinger
> From: Aurele <OzanneS...@gmail.com>
> Subject: [The Java Posse] Re: Posse Career Advice?
> To: "The Java Posse" <java...@googlegroups.com>
> Date: Monday, June 9, 2008, 11:22 AM
> Thanks for the advice everyone!
>
> "a career is something that they have to do to finance
> the stuff that
> they want to do."
>
> That's the pessimistic viewpoint and not entirely
> untrue. However,
> lots of people really do enjoy or at least engaged by their
> careers.
I subscribe to that view point and I don't find it pessimistic in the least. In fact, the things I enjoy doing more than coding, I doubt I'd enjoy doing on a professional level. The fact that my job is my job and not something I would choose to do on a Saturday afternoon doesn't mean that I don't care about it or that I don't derive any pleasure from it. I do, and occasionally I get passionate about a work project just as much as I do about my extra-curricular activities. The point though, is that I don't expect that from my job every day. When I'm tasked with something approaching busywork, I do try to make it more interesting with the use of alternative tools or even creating tools to assist in the dredge. I've had many opportunities to get mired in very boring activities, but with some calculated risk, I sometimes invest the time into productivity tools for myself and usually end up ahead of the ball anyway.
But really though, there's a whole lot more to life than work you do for money. I find my most rewarding experiences come from work I do for free or even pay to do. I also enjoy the hell out of moments when you get to mix and match your skills across disciplines. That doesn't happen in a normal career all that much, except for when you're running your own start-up or are a major contributor to one. I've done a lot of startup work (for others) and wouldn't trade it for anything, but it would really have to be something special for me to go back to that now. I'd rather do my own thing and not take as much of a financial risk.
Alexey
2001 Honda CBR600F4i (CCS)
1992 Kawasaki EX500
http://azinger.blogspot.com
http://bsheet.sourceforge.net
http://wcollage.sourceforge.net
Peter Becker
There is the option to work because you like to and get money for that
because you need to in this society we live in. I have been lucky
enough to have jobs that I really wanted to do in the past. At those
times I didn't work for the money, and I never kept track of the hours
spent working either -- my work was my hobby and my hobby was my work.
Of course these jobs aren't easy to find. I currently do not have such
job and I do not know good advice on finding one, but I know they
exist -- at least with my range of interests. Maybe one day someone
pays me to invent the programming language to come after Java :-)
I think in general it is better to have people who are intrinsically
motivated (i.e. do stuff because they want to) instead of
extrinsically motivated (do stuff for other benefits such as money).
In fact I believe that most nerds are pretty hard to motivated
extrinsically, they take some crap in their work, but they get very
inefficient fast if the only motivators are money and career options.
I believe everyone should have a job they like doing for itself. I
don't think that that is feasible for a majority in the near future,
but there are jobs out there for IT people who fit into that picture,
and I think that is what the original poster was looking for. Saying
that the career is just a way to earn money is very pessimistic in
that context.
Peter
Christian Catchpole
> What are some good careers to go into?
Peter Becker
I think they are quite specieistic and don't take humans.
Peter
Christian Catchpole
> I think they are quite specieistic and don't take humans.
automatically reject anything submitted on paper anyway).
But seriously.. :) Some random thoughts on career..
Your "career" is an issusion created by a capitalist machine to
convice you of the need to enagage years of hard, thankless work,
purely for the benefit of fat cat shareholders, as your fragile spirit
is crushed as it greases the cogs.
.. but if you insist. You really do need passion for what you are
doing. I don't think the IT industry realy works without it. A bored
brick layer can still keep then straight. A bored programmer has a
harder time. When I get bored with work I try to get concepts and
technologies that interest me, involved. So I'm less concered that
the project as a whole may be a little boring. You get drawn into
things you never thought you would. But the details can be just as
interesting. I started in educational multi-media and ended up in
transaction switching.
Michael Neale
> so I need to do exactly what they want whether I like it or not. That
> attitude is completely fair.
somewhere you are treated like the professional you are. If they pay
you well, they should value what you say.
Michael Neale
> of jobs that I really want: where I get to work on something
> interesting, I get some degree of autonomy, there is basic job
> stability, and the money is decent.
lots of lawyers, accountaints who are very well paid. They all hate
their job with a passion, and these are successful people.
I know quite a few doctors (specialists) who spent all their life
until their mid-30's effectively studying, they have better job
satisfaction, but they really are 100% "the job" - there is no space
for anything else for them - sometimes they admit that life has passed
them by, but the "God complex" kicks in early, where they view their
job as a critical mission (and rightly so - no one else in their right
mind would work as much as they do under such terrible circumstances -
and its NOTHING like the shows on TV, as a pediatrician friend of mine
said "there is no time to be neurotic cause your f****** pager goes
off every 5 f***** seconds").
So we in software have it pretty good really. Sure, there are a
majority of not-good jobs, but thats what your resume is for. Go find
what you want ! Or, better yet, start what you want !
>
> What are some good careers to go into? What kind of classes should I
> take at night? What skills should I try to learn in my free time?
David Linsin
> doing. I don't think the IT industry realy works without it.
I totally agree and I think you are not able to do a good job if you
are not passionate about it!
with kind regards,
David Linsin
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
email: dli...@gmail.com
blog: http://dlinsin.blogspot.com
Viktor Klang
I totally agree and I think you are not able to do a good job if you
> .. but if you insist. You really do need passion for what you are
> doing. I don't think the IT industry realy works without it.
are not passionate about it!
I would never hire an IT-guy/gal without makes absolutely sure that they are passionate about what I'm hiring them for.
Results are better if people enjoy what they do.
Cheers,
-V
with kind regards,
David Linsin
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
email: dli...@gmail.com
blog: http://dlinsin.blogspot.com
On Jun 10, 2008, at 7:33 AM, Christian Catchpole wrote:
>
> On Jun 10, 2:39 pm, "Peter Becker" <peter.becker...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> I think they are quite specieistic and don't take humans.
>
> I was wondering why my application kept coming back rejected (robots
> automatically reject anything submitted on paper anyway).
>
> But seriously.. :) Some random thoughts on career..
>
> Your "career" is an issusion created by a capitalist machine to
> convice you of the need to enagage years of hard, thankless work,
> purely for the benefit of fat cat shareholders, as your fragile spirit
> is crushed as it greases the cogs.
>
> .. but if you insist. You really do need passion for what you are
> doing. I don't think the IT industry realy works without it. A bored
> brick layer can still keep then straight. A bored programmer has a
> harder time. When I get bored with work I try to get concepts and
> technologies that interest me, involved. So I'm less concered that
> the project as a whole may be a little boring. You get drawn into
> things you never thought you would. But the details can be just as
> interesting. I started in educational multi-media and ended up in
> transaction switching.
>
>
> >
--
Viktor Klang
Rogue Software Architect
David Linsin
> they are passionate about what I'm hiring them for.
> Results are better if people enjoy what they do.
If you have incompetent HR and some developer who doesn't give a sh**
about his job recruiting people, then you can imagine what kinds of
people you'll have to work with!
with kind regards,
David Linsin
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
email: dli...@gmail.com
blog: http://dlinsin.blogspot.com
Viktor Klang
If you have incompetent HR and some developer who doesn't give a sh**
> I would never hire an IT-guy/gal without makes absolutely sure that
> they are passionate about what I'm hiring them for.
> Results are better if people enjoy what they do.
about his job recruiting people, then you can imagine what kinds of
people you'll have to work with!
Unfortunately yes. :/
-V
Alexey
> On Tue, Jun 10, 2008 at 3:38 AM, Alexey Zinger <inline_f...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > --- On Mon, 6/9/08, Aurele <OzanneSerap...@gmail.com> wrote:
don't mean to imply that I "hate" my job or that I don't derive any
pleasure from it whatsoever. What I'm trying to say is that at my
job, I behave like a professional, and in my hobbies I get to play a
little, even when I get so serious about it, that it feels like a job
at times. I really feel that everyone needs to have some such outlet,
where they are allowed to be a true amateur and engage in something
(even if it's in the same general discipline as their day job) for the
sake of personal satisfaction alone (take the hard way because it's
more interesting, explore, take risks, etc.). Why else does our
beloved Joe go out to play at the race track, as do I? Why have I
never run across a teammate at work I enjoyed working with, who didn't
have something going on the side, be it arts, sports, or what have
you? Why do people do open source work in their free time when they
can just stay late at the office?
Just as I don't like the prospect of working with someone who is
completely dispassionate about their work, I also don't wanna be
working with someone who has nothing else going on in their life.
Those people will not necessarily be looking for ways to reduce the
amount of their work, will likely be overly aggressive in their
timeline estimations, will be less receptive to business requirements
they don't understand, and have little respect for other people's
needs external to the job. It's all about balance.